


Sunday Dive

by thatfangirl



Category: Firefly
Genre: F/F, Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2007-03-12
Updated: 2007-03-12
Packaged: 2017-10-05 11:48:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,005
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/41445
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thatfangirl/pseuds/thatfangirl
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Water, gentlemen, is the one substance from which the earth can conceal nothing.  It sucks out its innermost secrets and brings them to our very lips."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Sunday Dive

**Author's Note:**

> Firefly/Serenity belongs to Joss Whedon and various corporate entities. No money is being made and no infringement is intended.
> 
> Summary quote from "The Madwoman of Chaillot" by Jean Giraudoux. Written for samfeasor as part of femslash07.

After the transmission, students rioted on the central planets and politicians hastened to express their shock. Two undersecretaries resigned before Parliament had even organized an inquest, but nothing really changed. Sometimes Inara wondered what Mal had expected to happen. Rather than return to the training house, she moved back into her shuttle. She wondered what Mal expected after that, too.

She was in the shuttle, hanging one last tapestry, when Kaylee kissed her. Inara pushed her away gently, saying, "I thought you and Simon were together."

"We are," Kaylee agreed cheerfully, "but not in an exclusive way. Unless—you and the captain are...?"

"No," Inara said, scowling. "Not in any way."

Kaylee nodded at this, then kissed her again, and that was that.

*

During meals, Inara sat on one side of Kaylee and Simon sat on the other. They both found excuses to touch her arm, and Kaylee whispered into alternate ears. Sometimes Simon would give Inara looks that were simultaneously speculative and embarrassed. It wasn't hard to divine what he was considering, and she had been in threesomes before, but he didn't interest her and he couldn't pay her.

As usual, it took Mal awhile to figure out what was going on, but he was too busy trying to suss out how to help Zoe to start trouble over Kaylee's affairs. Besides, he and Inara had other things to fight about. Officially, no one knew who had sent the transmission, but all of Mal's contacts had turned up dead with remarkably coincidental timing, so no one wanted to deal with him. Inara did her best to supplement their income, which kept them closer to the core than Mal liked, and meant that he had to accept her charity, which he despised. One night she ran into him leaving Zoe's room. Rather than returning her "Good evening," he stared at her for a good minute before scampering away, and was a lot more conciliatory after that.

It turned out that one of the things Simon had been wanting but not allowing himself to have was Kaylee to himself. They didn't fight: he told her what he wanted and she told him no. Even without Book and Wash, the ship was small enough for Inara to know what had happened before Kaylee told her, and to be thankful that Simon had made that mistake before she had. Inara had given Simon and Kaylee the run of the ship, keeping to her shuttle save for meals, but after that Kaylee lured her to the engine room and ruined one of her dresses. Inara didn't mind, and was complacently daubing at the grease when Mal bounded into the shuttle.

"Got work," he said, and she didn't have it in her to rebuke him for not knocking. "Medical delivery to Whitefall, and ain't no Patience there to trouble us this time." He shuffled his feet a bit and added shyly, "The supplies won't get here 'til tomorrow if you...if you an' Kaylee...want to take a look around?"

*

Normally Inara found nothing to enjoy about the Eavesdown Docks, but she gamely borrowed some of Kaylee's clothes and stepped into the throng. In the brown skirt and a t-shirt marked with a lurid cartoon octopus, no one gave her a second look. Kaylee laughed at the slight widening of Inara's eyes and took her hand.

Kaylee chatted gaily as barkers called to them from the various ships and vendors tried to sell them roasted dog and other meals that made Inara pale. They passed a fruit merchant and Kaylee's grin faltered at the half-green strawberries; Inara bought her the safest-looking bag of candied nuts from a neighboring stall and that seemed to distract Kaylee from thoughts of Book. They strolled on, Kaylee leaning into Inara's shoulder, their arms linked. Kaylee never made Inara feel like a whore, but she didn't make her feel like a Companion, either—

"'Nara," Kaylee said, not for the first time.

Inara blinked and looked up; somehow they had reached a more reputable commercial street. Kaylee had stopped them in front of a squat brick building; the faded sign over the door read "East Heaven Hot Tubs."

"Can we?" Kaylee asked.

With the job, Mal didn't need as much of her money—although, knowing Mal, it would turn sour somehow. The stink of engine exhaust and fried meat clung to her skin, so Inara felt no guilt when she said, "Of course."

A bell over the door tinkled as they stepped inside. Immediately, an old woman emerged from a back room and began fussing over them in Mandarin. Inara bargained the woman down to two-thirds of the normal rate and they were lead down a hallway lined with worn doors. Vague images of a rough wooden tub filled tepid water threatened at the edges of Inara's mind, but when they were finally admitted to a room, it was dominated by a gorgeous in-floor tub hewn from black granite.

Kaylee's hand flew to her open mouth. The woman knelt over the controls at the edge of the tub and it began to fill with water. An explanation of the various toggles followed, but Inara was too enthralled by Kaylee's joy to listen.

As soon as the door clicked shut, Kaylee stripped off her coveralls and slid into the tub. "Come on," she urged and Inara unstuck her attention from breasts already roseate from the heat. She folded the borrowed clothes and carefully lowered herself into the water. Warmth suffused her body.

Inara settled on a ledge cut across the corner and Kaylee settled against her side. Kaylee pointed out the mo-shui landscapes tacked on the walls and demonstrated her own watercolor technique on Inara's shoulder. There was no urgency in her touch, but no lethargy either. "Whatcha thinkin'?" she asked.

The thought emerged like a bubble rising to the surface of the water: for the first time in a long time, Inara was starting to feel like someone's lover.

"I'm not," she said, and kissed her.


End file.
